I ran my first marathon in 1982. It was a race called the White Rock Marathon, named after the lake it ran around. I don’t remember a lot about it, other than being scared silly. I finished in 3:49:09, which I was pretty happy with. You only get one chance to run a first marathon. I’m glad this was mine.

I ran it two more times before life sent me down the road to Arizona. I always toyed with the idea of going back, but never quite made it.

Mostly, I loved that name. White Rock Marathon. Run the Rock. It has a nice ring. Great name for a marathon.

Now that I find myself back in Tejas, Mo and I had kicked around the idea of going this year. I’ve got an old best friend who lives in Flower Mound; Mo has one on a farm a ways north. Seemed like a great weekend.

And then.

They just announced a name change. The Dallas Marathon. I can only imagine the brainstorming sessions that came up with that masterwork of creativity. I guess it’s driven by marketing and the requirement to have The Blah Blah Dallas Marathon as the name. But still. That’s not the name of the race. The race is White Rock.

Is there no limit to what races will do to bring in more money? What’s next? McDonald’s signing on as the official fast food of the Rock ‘n’ Roll series?

Oh.

The new Dallas logo says Est. 1971. No, it wasn’t. You established it yesterday.

When I was young, it was cool-kid shorthand. You running the Rock this year? Yup. You? Yeah. See you there.

8 Responses to A marathon by any other name

The Rock was my first marathon, too, in 1992 and I also ran it two other times; it means a lot to me. When I got the email yesterday, what first took me aback was when they stated that by changing the name, it was now going to be a “first class running event” (aka: they want to bring in the big names). I don’t get how changing a name is going to attract the elite fields….but what do I know, I ran my first marathon there in only 3:59:23. It makes me sad….I don’t want to run The Dallas Marathon, I want to run Dallas White Rock Marathon!

Being mildly curious about the date of this soon-to-be famous event, I found the press release announcing the name change. It noted that the race now has “a new, contemporized logo identity.”
Now there’s your whole problem, Gary. Little things like this new, improved race name wouldn’t grate on you if you’d just get a properly contemporized identity.

It was my first marathon as well, and my second half marathon. Sad to see the changes. Word has it that the new route will only skirt the east side of the lake, and possibly bypass Lakewood and Swiss Ave altogether (seems the neighbors don’t like the inconvenience). Had to laugh at the date on the logo!